


Good as Mine

by MissScorp



Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Extended Scene, Family, Father-Son, Gen, Gil trying to comfort Malcolm, Malcolm Bright Needs a Hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-02
Updated: 2019-11-02
Packaged: 2021-01-20 17:41:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21285611
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissScorp/pseuds/MissScorp
Summary: Gil recalls a conversation where Martin Whitly tells him that he's not Malcolm's father. Extended scene to 1x05.
Relationships: Gil Arroyo & Malcolm Bright, Malcolm Bright & Martin Whitly
Comments: 17
Kudos: 134





	Good as Mine

Dani was barely out the door when the kid turned to him and insisted, again, she couldn't be their killer.

"The profile doesn't fit."

Gil studied Bright as he contemplated how to reply. Quiet, earnest, and confident in his profile that the person who killed Gavin Parker was a sadist experiencing the thrill of murder for the first time. There was just one problem as far as Gil was concerned: the confession he, Dani and Bright saw and heard less than two minutes ago.

While he silently acknowledged there was a slim possibility that the kid was right and that Crystal Parker didn't fit the profile, there was also every indication he was wrong and that she did. _And he needs to accept when he's wrong_.

"This one does." Gil softened his rebuke with a smile. "I'm sorry, Bright."

His words didn't appease the kid any. No, they only seemed to agitate him more than he already was. Bright had a blind spot when it came to the Parker's son, Isaac. He saw a bit of himself in Isaac. He denied it when he pointed it out to him, insisted it wasn't the reason for his not believing Mrs. Parker fit the profile, but Gil didn't believe him.

He remembered what Bright had been like after his father got arrested. Withdrawn, confused, jittery, depressed, refusing to speak to anyone, barely sleeping or eating, and wracked with guilt. Gil made the decision to become part of the kid's life because he needed someone to help him overcome what his father did to him.

Jessica Whitly tried, in her own fashion, but she wasn't able to give her son the things he needed. Not when she was also struggling to cope with what her husband had done. Things fragmented between them more after Bright started having night terrors. Her answer had been to get doctors to shove handfuls of pills down Bright.

Gil was there when the medication had the kid so zonked out he couldn't blink. He was also there for the side effects and the accidental overdoses. Getting the kid to see a woman who worked with traumatized children put a stop to the roulette wheel of pills his other doctors seemed content to pass out. Bright slowly started to get better. His problems didn't go away but he found a way to function and cope.

_Until he started visiting Martin Whitly _again.

Gil suspected the past was part of the kid's problem. _If he'd give up on figuring out what the missing pieces of his memories are and focus on making a life for _himself...

Not that he ever listened to him when he told him that.

There was one way he could always count on to tell him where Bright was mentally: his hands. The worse the tremors, the more Bright was struggling. A surreptitious glance showed there was a distinctive twitch to his hands, but it was no worse than usual.

_Well, that told me nothing_, he thought as Bright heaved a soft sigh. He fully expected him to citeagain how there was no way Crystal Parker fit the profile he came up with. When he didn't, Gil figured the conversation was at an end. Bright, however, caught him by surprise with his next words.

"I screwed up."

His brow furrowed. The kid had been wrong about Mrs. Parker being the one who murdered her husband, Gavin, sure. That didn't translate into him screwing up. Not in his mind, anyway.

"You're a profiler, Bright," he said. "Not a psychic." He set a hand on his shoulder. "You can't always know who the killer is."

The guilt didn't fade from Bright's eyes. Not that he expected it too. The kid was taking this personally. Almost as if he believed that not figuring out Mrs. Parker was the killer somehow made him just as guilty as her.

_Is that what he thinks about the murders Martin __Whitly__ committed? _He found himself wondering as he watched Bright stare at Isaac._ Does he think he's to blame because he didn't figure out what his father was doing and call the police on him sooner_?

He wouldn't rule it out. With Bright, it was best to keep all possibilities in mind. Expecting anything kept him from being shocked or angry when the kid did something that got him stabbed with a needle, shot or bitten by a poisonous snake. _Can't hold him getting stoned out of his mind against him. _

That was one incident no one expected to happen.

_Least of all Dani. _

He was about to suggest that the kid go home when Bright sighed again.

"He's losing both of his parents."

"Yeah, he is." Bright's gaze remained on the blond boy seated outside the interrogation room. Gil suspected he saw another boy sitting in that chair. One he couldn't stop remembering being but not for any of the right reasons. "That's not your fault, kid."

"I told Isaac he was gonna be okay." His shoulders drooped. "I promised him."

Gil set his hand on his shoulder and tried to mollify him by telling him, "It's what you say to a kid."

He ignored the voice that whispered about how he said the same thing to Bright after they arrested his father. The situations were not the same. Isaac's mother murdered his father because he was going to take him away from her. Martin Whitly killed for reasons that he never disclosed to anybody. _Not even his own son. _

"No." He closed his eyes. More a long blink than anything else. "No, I lied to him."

_And that_, Gil realized as he studied Bright's face, _is the heart of the problem_. He told Isaac everything would be okay and it turned out anything but.

"Bright..."

"None of this is okay." The eyes he turned to Gil were bleak. "It's never going to be okay."

Gil couldn't think of anything to say. Not that'd take away the guilt weighing so heavy on Bright. Much as he wanted to reach out and put a comforting arm around those thin shoulders, tell him everything would work out for Isaac, and that he

_"You're not his father_," Martin Whitly told him in a phone conservation they had a few years after his incarceration. "_I am."_

"_No, you're not, Doctor __Whitly_," Gil had replied. "_Because a real father wouldn't have put their son through what you have_."

He hung up before Whitly could say anything further. If his conversation with him had done anything, it was make him be there even more for Bright. To do what he could to fill the role that Martin Whitly vacated when he became The Surgeon.

Bright wasn't a traumatized kid anymore, though. The things that worked when he was a kid wouldn't work now that he was an adult. That's why he simply patted his shoulder before turning to exit the room.

When the kid was ready, he'd come to him, and they'd talk about whatever was really bothering him.

Like they always did.

_Not my son_, he thought as he shut the door behind him. _He's as good as mine_.

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, all! I hope this finds you well! This idea came to me after watching episode 1x05. It's an extended scene that looks at what Gil was thinking during his conversation with Malcolm.
> 
> Please, if you like this piece, kudo/bookmark it!


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